Rj. Benschop et al., RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN CARDIOVASCULAR AND IMMUNOLOGICAL CHANGES IN AN EXPERIMENTAL STRESS MODEL, Psychological medicine, 25(2), 1995, pp. 323-327
To investigate the relationships between cardiovascular variables (SEP
, DBP, and HR) and circulating natural killer (NK) cell numbers, 70 ma
le volunteers were subjected to a rest condition (N = 30) or a stressf
ul laboratory task (N = 40). At baseline, no significant relationships
could be demonstrated between the number of NK cells and the cardiova
scular variables. Analysis of covariance showed that the stressor indu
ced increases in the number of NK cells, SEP, DBP, and HR. Changes in
NK cell numbers were highly correlated to changes in cardiovascular va
riables in both the task and the no-task group. These results indicate
that there is no relationship between the number of circulating NK ce
lls and cardiovascular levels per se, but that changes in these variab
les, either stress-induced or under rest conditions, are regulated by
a common mechanism.